Customer Service By: Amber Lange Customer Service By: Amber Lange

 Google says Customer Service is: “noun. The assistance and advice provided by a company to those people who buy or use its products or services.”

 Where: Summer field trip to the zoo  When: 4 th grade  Who: A random woman, and a vendor  Witnesses: A friend, and me  Why: The woman was being a difficult customer  Woman  Vendor  Narrator  Me and my friend

 (A woman walks up to a vendors stand at the Zoo. A friend and I get in line behind her.)  “Hi,” she smiles cheerfully.  “Hello, what can I get you?” he asks.  (She thinks for a minute.)  “ I will have a soft pretzel please,” she decides.

 (He grabs her food and hands it to her. She rips off a piece and eats it before she pays and makes a face.)  “This is way to salty,” she says, “can I have another one?”  “Sure, give me one second,” he gives a forced smile.  (He grabs out another and hands it to her)  “This is so soft! It must be undercooked! I can’t take this one I need another.” the woman exclaims.

 “Ma’am I am sorry you are dissatisfied with our products but I cannot give you another,” the vendor sighs.  (The woman is starting to get agitated.)  “Fine! I will just take some cookies. I want a sample first,” she says.  “Ok. Here you go,” he replies calmly.  (He slides a small carton of cookies across the vendor station and offers for her to try one. She grabs a cookie and takes a bite. This time she almost spits it out she looks so disgusted.)

 “This is disgusting! They are rock hard and the taste is just terrible! I cant buy these! Can I try another batch?” she practically shouts.  “I’m sorry but there is nothing I can do,” the vendors eyes widen in terror.  “This is ridiculous,” she shouts, “just give me a bottle of water.”  (He takes a bottle of water out of the fridge and slides it across the vendor station. She grabs it and slaps exact change down on the counter and walks away.)

 (My friend and I approach the counter and he smiles at us with a very forced smile.)  “And what would you girls like today?” he asks with fake cheer.  “Um, one Pepsi, one Sprite, and two soft pretzels.  “Ok that is $7.65.”  “Thank you!” we smile.  (We both take bites of our pretzels.)  “Are they ok?” he asks with a worried smile.

 “Yes. They’re perfect.”  (He smiles and thanks us. We hand over a ten dollar bill and let him keep the change. And then we just walked away. As we walked away we saw how relieved he was to have at least a couple of satisfied customers.)

 Complaining  Nothing satisfied her  She just argued to argue

 Stayed calm  Stayed polite  Tried to reason with her

 Be extra polite to the employee if they did well  Tip them  Tell them they did well  Tell someone